


Budapest

by millihelenic



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Budapest, Drabble Sequence, F/M, Farsightedness, Poem Sequence, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-03
Updated: 2012-06-03
Packaged: 2017-11-06 18:41:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/421931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/millihelenic/pseuds/millihelenic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And this should scare you.<br/>This, the way she reads your vertebrae<br/>  like a blueprint; this,<br/>how she infiltrates you, traces paths<br/>along your jaw, crawls into<br/>every neuron of you, makes you tremble,<br/>makes you shiver, as if she's<br/>researched you—maybe she has—as if<br/>she knows you, has known you—<br/>  and who's to say she hasn't?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Budapest

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wanderlast](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wanderlast/gifts).



> Thanks to Lianne and Cally for the beta and support. :)

**1**

You dreamed of this place once  
when you were a child, and Budapest  
clung to the page of an old book.  
That night, you prowled  
through cobblestone streets,  
through dusty libraries,  
and you rested your hand  
on a verdigris statue.

Time runs a line through your arms,  
straight as the path  
from your fingertips to your elbow.  
The sun beats down on your shoulders;  
roof tiles dig into your heels. 

      Distance 

magnifies the poetry written  
in the curls of her hair; 

      space 

reveals the light gilding  
her green eyes gold.

(When you were a child and Budapest  
was the moon setting over a river,  
you didn’t think that history  
could be something small and intimate.  
   History to you  
was occupations and battles and war;  
   history was not  
damasked walls and sniper targets  
   and two people who  
      but for their convictions  
   mattered nothing to the world.)

You are only a spot against the sky,  
   but you still cannot afford  
   to let that sliver of gold  
turn whole.

Time bends  
      and pauses.

**2**

Her absence  
   marks her presence.  
You realize too late  
that you did not catch glimpses of her—  
   she is the one  
      who caught you.

**3**

You meet in a hotel room.  
Close combat was never your forte.  
She plays you,  
   you play her;  
this is a dance,  
each step  
   a lie raised,  
  a lie broken,  
and your mutual deception  
is weapon enough for both of you.

You’re face-to-face  
when you reach a truce—  
she’ll let you live  
if you let her live—  
and what you don’t say  
is that you’re not doing this  
   out of fear for your life,  
but  
 out of want for hers.

**4**

It should end there, but it doesn’t.  
Instead, a building explodes;  
instead, you’re fighting alongside her;  
instead, you meet again, this time at dusk,  
and her language is your language is the way  
tenseness melts is the way her lips meet yours  
is the way the only word either of you needs  
      is _yes_.

And this should scare you.  
This, the way she reads your vertebrae  
  like a blueprint; this,  
how she infiltrates you, traces paths  
along your jaw, crawls into  
every neuron of you, makes you tremble,  
makes you shiver, as if she's  
researched you—maybe she has—as if  
she knows you, has known you—  
   and who's to say she hasn't? 

But you lean into her anyway,  
  arrow bent by the wind,  
two degrees off target,  
      and missing  
has never felt so good.

**5**

Later, when your mind is not your own, when blue  
your soul is blue, when blue your veins are blue,  
when blue the edges of your pupils sing blue,  
she flashes redder than sunsets balanced  
      on the crosshairs of a church spire.

You didn't kill her that time.  
            You won't kill her this time. 

And _sorry_ you want to mouth _sorry, I'm sorry,_  
_I'm sorry for all this_. That touch you craved  
becomes a touch whose destruction you crave  
and _sorry_ the bands around your arm  
are too tight and _sorry_ your quiver  
presses hard against your back and _sorry_  
you quiver, you quake, and _sorry, sorry, sorry—_  
__  
  
She strikes you,  
      splits a red horizon across your mind,  
and blue crashes against your temples,  
      scrabbles for a hold, spreads ten thousand wings,  
            beats oilslick napes into one shadow.

                        Your world goes black.

**6**

_this is you this is you this is you_  
and _this is_ a mantra beating  
against _you_ r skull, trembling as if to fill you  
   with remembrance. 

When she is this close, she fades into  
the accumulation of familiar shapes.  
The one you fell in love with  
  is the one who is sharp around the edges;  
the one with you now  
  is the one whose boundaries blur,  
who smiles, who knows when to free you,  
   whose words  
      return you.

She leans into you.  
Light dips into the notch of  
   her cupid’s bow.  
She pulls back the line of  
your lower lip;  
   her hand cupping your face  
draws your entire body taut. 

When she is this close,  
    it’s only force of habit  
   that keeps your eyes open.  
You never told her, but she knows—  
  of course she knows. Her eyelashes flutter  
against your skin, paint sparks  
 along your cheeks, and maybe your eyes  
aren’t so useless here.

You don’t need to know every detail of her  
   to love her. 

The rush of green flooding your vision  
as she looks straight into you  
   is enough.


End file.
